Absinthe and Laudanum
by Lykosdracos
Summary: (COMPLETE) From Hell- Abberline's last few moments alive, based on the original ending. I thought that finding him like that as an ending... graceless. So I added in what happened before and his last thoughts before...
1. Last Moments

Final Decision  
  
Authors Note: One-shot fiction describing the original ending of From Hell. I've heard on the DVD there is an alternate ending, the only one I saw was where he was old gray-haired and he died the same way! I read online that there is supposed to be one where he and Mary went off to be together. Where is that? Can anyone tell me?  
  
Authors Note 2: I've been researching Jack the Ripper like a madperson! I've always had a fascination on him, it's great to put what I've learned into a fanfic story especially since it's a Johnny Depp one! Lol. Anything and everything I can read about the Ripper, it's all so interesting!  
  
It had been three weeks since he'd last seen Mary, two since he last read her letter. That she knew how to write surprised him at first, but then he remembered how she had asked him if he thought her always an 'unfortunate.' Of course she knew how to read and write, even though she walked the streets she was a lady through and through.  
  
A rose by any other name... he was certain now why fallen women were called unfortunates. It was because they couldn't help the situation they were in, many beautiful women had been broken under the bitter streets of Whitechapel. They turned to drink and the sheer need for a roof over their heads for the night no matter that it might be a doss house roof.  
  
He mixed the laudanum and absinthe concoction, he only wanted to see her one last time was it so much to ask? He didn't know when it happened actually, all he knew was that she was unlike anyone he had ever met and he loved her.  
  
Constable Withers had offered to promote him. Again. Abberline pounded his fist down on the table in anger. Sometimes he cursed being a part of Scotland Yard and having to work under conditions and policies. The times he was right Withers took all the credit, Abberline didn't mind that not at all, but in the Ripper case, how many lives would have been saved had he only listened to reason!  
  
Withers was a man blinded by what the press would write in the tabloids the following morning. Could the man not see that the press would write regardless of any efforts being made to control the hysteria? The Whitechapel murderer lurked, skulked and killed in the dead of night. He would get women were they not in bed by nightfall and ate little children for supper. Abberline had heard them all and the people embellished upon them even further.  
  
They were supposed to be upholders of the law, while Abberline's methods weren't always traditional nor professional, he strove to make sure innocents weren't killed. The Ripper had been as flesh and blood as any of them and now that he was locked behind the madhouse doors the streets were relatively safe again. As safe as they could ever be considering the district.  
  
Are you questioning my decision, Withers had asked him. Bloody hell, yes he was. Sitting behind his desk venturing out only when his reputation might be marred and not understanding a thing when he did. The Ripper case had just been a misunderstanding, according to him: Jack the Ripper had just been a madman wanting to kill for the pleasure of killing. No furrier, butcher, surgeon, and god forbid the mention of an educated man be mentioned in accordance with the tragic deaths.  
  
Abberline himself knew he was considered an absinthe and 'chaser of the dragon' addict. It only bothered him when they didn't take his predictions seriously. Did they honestly think that he willingly poisoned himself and awoke with the worst headache known to man just for the hell of it!  
  
He had been to doctors prescribed to him by Withers and Godfroy, all of them had the same answer. He was dying, slowly but it was inevitable. They said the only way he might have a chance at surviving would be never to touch laudanum and absinthe again, but even that was up to the fates.  
  
How could he even consider such a thing? It didn't stop the visions from coming when he walked down the street. It was torture knowing that in a particular place a woman was beaten to death by her drunken husband, knowing that a man would be stabbed to death by the mother of his children because he failed to bring her home gin.  
  
He had helped to save so many lives, he gave Scotland Yard evidence and proof that they wouldn't have otherwise. He once tried giving it all up, that was right before the Ripper murders started. He took it as a sign that he couldn't afford the luxury of living normally when he had the chance of saving more.  
  
"You will be closely watched, Abberline. Mark my words." He lay back on the bed in the middle of a room and closed his eyes for a moment. Withers had been true to his words and would be until Abberline offered him an official apology. It would be a cold day in hell when that happened.  
  
Even now he could feel the old man's throat closing beneath his hands and wasn't guilty or ashamed at his behavior. In fact years of being dismissed from 'important' company, told he was wrong, and having his ideas waved by had welled up inside of him. Had Godfroy not pulled him away... Scotland Yard would be out one more constable. No great loss.  
  
He only hoped Mary Kelly was happy in where she was. All the money he could find had been put into that envelope. He would always remember her beautiful red hair turned the color of fire by the sun. The way her eyes lit up when speaking of the fate of the unfortunates, the dry wit she had mastered perfectly.  
  
The only reason he 'chased the dragon' was to steady his nerves for the acrid taste of laudanum and absinthe. Apart the two could be handled, together they formed a ghastly mixture that might have sent a lesser man to the bushes hurling, or to the morgue for coffin fittings.  
  
All he could think of now was Mary standing in the gallery remarking that Queen Victoria looked cold. He had nearly choked on his laughter, most people would say she was regal or proud. Mary had said she her eyes were cold. A truer phrase he had yet to think of. She looked so right among the wondrously painted portraits, he wanted to buy her fine dresses like the one woman who had stopped to stare.  
  
Dressed as she was, Mary didn't even pause in climbing the stairs. She had an inner sense of pride that women of real wealth could only hope to imitate. Years of surviving on the street had given her courage, rationality, and dependence only on herself.  
  
The drink glowed green in the dim lighting, the people here were used to him by now. They wouldn't mind if he drank himself into a stupor to allow the visions to take over. He knew that it was killing him, he didn't need doctors to tell him. Every time he drank it down the pain behind his eyes grew worse.  
  
He summoned up one last remembrance of her before he downed the contents and faced the pain like a man. "It wasn't payment you know, I'm still a woman, they haven't taken that from me yet."  
  
He couldn't bear the pain in her eyes, she didn't understand! It wasn't that her station that bothered him, he couldn't care less. He wouldn't have minded if she were a circus attraction so long as she treated him like a real person and spoke what she thought. He just didn't want to add more pain to her life, she deserved someone who would not only give her beautiful children but be there to watch them grow up.  
  
She would have walked away from him then after throwing coins she needed on the street. It was the fear of never seeing her again that had him reaching out to lightly grab her arm. He looked into her eyes and without thinking about it his lips met hers.  
  
Her back touched the wall of a building and still he continued to kiss her, passion, need to explain, and even love was in that kiss. Her quick intake of breath alerted him that they weren't alone anymore. A policeman brandishing a night stick came over to investigate.  
  
One last fleeting glimpse, their eyes met and held before she took the money he offered again and went to get rent a doss house. He hated watching her walk away from him but he couldn't protect her by bringing her home. She would be in even more danger that way and so would he. They had already been seen together, he was supposed to be watching out for her and he took her into the middle of the fiasco.  
  
She had come to him one night to say goodbye, she said that once the Ripper case was over and done with she would take him to Ireland with her. He could still feel her warmth and see the pure happiness in her eyes as he brought her bliss never felt before. She was gone when he awoke, back to the doss house in the mid-afternoon so as not to provoke the killer. Her presence lingered, everywhere he had looked reminded him of her.  
  
He raised the glass to his mouth and drank down the green liquid as fast as he could. It was horrid the taste that touched his tongue and burned it's way down his throat. His stomach heaved dangerously but he took deep breaths and counted the seconds.  
  
Any minute now and the pain would subside, it had too he couldn't take much more of this. Visions of Mary dressed in soft cotton, the white in her dress brought out her eyes and made her hair sparkle.  
  
Ireland was a beautiful place, a blonde haired little girl carried a doll and ran through the waves along a beach. Salt wafted through the air enveloping them both in it's hold erasing all memories of Whitechapel and it's horrors.  
  
Mary smiled at the sight of her daughter, the healthy tint to her skin. There was plenty of money for food and anything they might need left. If it ever ran low she would hire herself out as a seamstress and be paid that way. She could sew anything put in front of her. Aprons, dresses, trousers, quilts, blankets, once even a pair of shoes. No other man would claim her body again, her days of working for shillings and pennies were over.  
  
"Mama?" Rosalinde asked seeing the faraway look in her mothers eyes.  
  
"Yes, sweet?" Mary replied all of her attention fixed on her daughter.  
  
"Tell me about papa again?" she sat next to Mary on the stairs and snuggled close for a tale.  
  
"Your father was a very brave man." She started, "'e's working in London still savin' lives and 'elping the innocent. 'e was one of the best, smart, daring, 'e could catch any bad man there was."  
  
"Will he come soon?"  
  
"I don't know, love." Mary sighed looking at the ocean, "I hope so. Abberline would be ever so proud of you."  
  
"What did he look like?" the little girl asked shielding her eyes from the sun.  
  
"Like a prince." She sighed remembering, "Dark black wavy hair, the deepest eyes you'd e'er see on a man. 'e was tall, but not tall enough to tower o'er me, you ken. Graceful, elegant, the perfect gentleman in every way possible even though his accent was different than any I'd ever 'eard. Maybe American born, certainly not the likes of those from England. When 'e smiled I could see the light in his eyes, a fine-sculpted face 'e 'ad."  
  
"Does he love us?"  
  
"Ever so much." Mary ruffled Rosalinde's hair, "'e'll be 'ere soon, I can feel it in the wind."  
  
"You can?"  
  
"Aye, as clear as you see the clouds in the sky." Tears formed behind her eyes, but she wouldn't let them fall. "Why don't you go and play while I fix us shepard's pie, hm?"  
  
Abberline held two copper coins in his hand careful to not let them fall he drifted off into the realm of dreams. He was with them at last, his daughter laughed and raced him across the sand. At night Mary lay with him, her head on his shoulder the red tresses laid out across his arm.  
  
Whitechapel had ceased to exist for him and Jack the Ripper was a wisp of smoke caught in the wind. He closed his eyes contentedly and was dead to the world. The twentieth century had come and was slowly passing, Jack the Ripper had not been able to see it, but Abberline did. Gone at the second chime of midnight he was with Mary again, Mary and Rosalinde welcomed him home. 


	2. Alternate Ending fic

Justice Served Alternate Ending fic  
  
Authors Note: It was originally supposed to be only one chapter long, but then I got to thinking about Mary Kelly, and then from there, well, there's going to be two more chapters and then that'll be it. This is a fic responding to the last deleted scene...  
  
"Why, Abberline? Why aren't you 'ere?" the words whispered across the moonlit plains quietly only for her to understand. He loved her, of that she was certain. Why then hadn't he met her at the abbey.  
  
(A/N: That WILL be fixed, I forgot where she was going to go to get Baby Alice. I'm going to watch the movie again today and figure it out, then update with the correct information.)  
  
It was once said among the Whitechapel streets; a man can always be told by his kiss. Mary Kelly wouldn't know, the only man she let kiss her was her father. Some of the unfortunates allowed it, she never let anything near her mouth except food and drink.  
  
Martha and Dark Annie had laughed, 'who're you savin' yourself fer? No man on a white 'orse is goin t'be savin' ya.' Mary shrugged off the pain those words had caused, no man might save her but she would save herself. She was born in Ireland used to the same conditions of Whitechapel, but at least the air had been clean there.  
  
There are no whores in London, only unfortunates. She remembered saying that to Abberline right before he took her to the gallery. Through all her years of walking the streets nothing surprised her more than that. The fact that a Scotland Yard Investigator so high as himself wanted to spend time with her...  
  
It wasn't just for the Investigation either. She now felt horribly for all the things she called him. Useless, untalented, doddering, it was no worse than what others said but she should have known better! Just knowing that he cared enough to track them down and attend a funeral meant something.  
  
She had heard all about him from women who were willing to trade gossip with someone to talk too. They crooned over how handsome he was, Mary wouldn't disagree with them on that. They also said he wasn't a religious man with proof to conclude that. It was a dangerous rumor to let out, atheists were looked down upon and instantly converted before harm could befall them.  
  
Twas said that at a service Abberline had attended, the priest refused to commune with an unfortunate. Abberline had gently detained him and enforced that because it was a house of worship anyone could enter freely.  
  
He had never went back again instead throwing himself head-long into work occasionally visiting a local brothel. He bought no women though, only drank a mixture of absinthe and laudanum. She had heard word spread that he was demon-born because he could see crimes before they were committed. He was immensely successful the only murderer he wasn't able to catch was Jack the Ripper, but in actuality Jack had been caught. The public didn't know about that because it was too dangerous a secret to be let out.  
  
Alice was playing with the children of a widower down the road. She would be there for the rest of the day like she was nigh everyday now. There was food preserved on the table for supper, next to them was a small bottle of laudanum and absinthe.  
  
* * *  
  
Abberline had a horrible feeling in the put of his stomach. That wasn't unusual, he felt it every time he mixed the drink. This time there was an underlying anxiety that had him pick up the glass faster than usual.  
  
He knew not to succumb to the darkness until the green faded, but what harm would it do if he just let his mind relax a moment to gather his wits? Surely just a few seconds wouldn't matter...  
  
* * *  
  
Mary was drifting on a sea of pure green light, her entire world was thrown topsy-turvy and she knew not where she was anymore. Laying on the bed with her eyes open she could see yet not see anything familiar in the room.  
  
Her stomach rolled and jostled with the speed everything was spinning, it wasn't a pleasant sensation but it wasn't unpleasant either. She had left her body behind, her mind miles ahead. Everywhere she turned more green light, dark figures and whispered conversations.  
  
Then ahead of her something she knew, there was a familiar shape taking form. It was Abberline, what was he doing? He was entirely too pale, the black of his hair and eyes were tinted with green, not only that but he seemed to be floating. He looked at her, straight through her and still she didn't see any signs of recognition on his face.  
  
"No!" she screamed as she realized why he couldn't see her. "Abberline, no!"  
  
She was too far from him she couldn't catch his attention! He was dying, his form slowly fading from view. She couldn't let him disappear, she knew that if she did he would never wake up again.  
  
She gathered her strength and tried to force her mind to put her next to him. She nearly blacked out, but in the end succeeded in going through the green that threatened to carry her down.  
  
Abberline was tired, so tired he could barely keep conscious on the task at hand. All the years of punishing his body for human weakness and now he was finally able just to rest without the bothers of normal life. No Godley here to bring him back to the road of rationality, no Withers to make him mad enough to kill, just silence and- Mary!  
  
What was she doing! Didn't she know that laudanum and absinthe killed if not taken in the right dosage amount? Could she be part of his visions? Was she in danger? He focused all of his concentration on her and knew that she wasn't.  
  
"You can't give up, Abberline." She was saying tremulously, "Don't give up, I won't let you die."  
  
"I'm not going too, love." He said closing his eyes and sifting through his absinthe soaked mind for calm. She wouldn't be able to take much more, he was losing strength rapidly now that he had to use all of his willpower to stay with her. How had she managed to do it, could she possibly have some of the same clairvoyance as he?  
  
"You can 'ear me?" she asked staring at him for the first time realizing that he was no longer so pale and they were no longer completely surrounded by green.  
  
"Yes, but maybe not for long." he glanced around nervously, "What did you do, Mary?"  
  
"Absinthe and laudanum, same as you." She explained, "And it worked, I found you."  
  
"You have to promise me something." Abberline said hurriedly, "You have to promise never to mix or drink them together ever again."  
  
"Why-"  
  
"You might not wake up next time, there's not much time. Promise me."  
  
"I promise." She didn't want to let him go, "Promise me you'll live to be old and have children, find a woman who loves you."  
  
"I've already found one." He smiled sadly, "As to growing old... only time will tell."  
  
"Children?" she whispered.  
  
"Not in this lifetime so it seems." He put a lock of her hair behind her ear, "Be happy, Mary Kelly."  
  
"I will. You be happy too, and I love you, Abberline."  
  
He took as much as the absinthe inside his own body as he could, then made sure she would wake up and not feel any of the effects. He would live to see another day, he wouldn't break the promise he made to her so easily. She faded from view and he was for the first time in his life glad that the absinthe shielded him from feeling anything.  
  
"I love you too." He said, then he waited for the green to fade before reuniting mind and body together. He looked up into the dark confines of his room and threw the two coins in his hand across the room.  
  
* * *  
  
Baby Alice could no longer be called a baby, now she was a beautiful woman of eight and thirty. Mary Kelly was three and sixty, she couldn't be happier. She had never married or looked at another man, the only person she cared about was Alice and making sure they never lacked for anything.  
  
One night when the sadness pulling at her heart was too much to bear she wrote four letters on a sheet of parchment, sealed it into a glass bottle, and threw it into the ocean. She sat on the beach for hours watching the waves carry the bottle away out into the great sea. It was foolish of her, an old Irish legend, but somehow in her heart she knew someone would find it.  
  
* * *  
  
Abberline lay quietly on a red upholstered cot in the middle of a brothel room and mixed the drink. He lacked the energy to tie his mind to the world but he could see Mary again.  
  
Godley found him in the morning, white hair spread out behind him and the two customary coins in his hand. He was buried with marks of honor, no one saw the folded up piece of paper in the pocket of his jacket.  
  
~I kept my promise.~ 


	3. Love and Grief

Chapter 3 Authors Note: Every time I watch From Hell again I have this inane urge to write something for it. Never mind that I have two stories already, no, I have to keep thinking of more, right? Lol  
  
Authors Note 2: After you read the first two paragraphs you'll say, what the hell IS this? But I promise that if you stick with it, at least to my point of view, it gets better. I hope you think so too, and if you don't? Flame away, feel free.  
  
Love and grief; strange how those two work together so wondrously. Love creeps up slowly ensnaring the senses until it consumes entirely every living, breathing part man has to give.  
  
It makes the sprit leap and bound, one who falls under love's spell sees the world in an entirely different view. Love makes men attempt the unattempted, risk anything that can be lost, and perform what otherwise couldn't be done.  
  
It can take one from the top of paradise to the dregs of hell in one fell swoop. The mind whirls with it's magic until all rational thought is gone, swept away in waves of pure unadulterated bliss. Blind to all faults and unseeing of flaw it makes men puppets to it's will, they are content with how things are and will fight if any would dare to try and change them.  
  
Love is a beautiful thing, none can live long without it or last without searching for it in some form or another. There are many forms of love; parents to their children, men and their women, religious believers in their deities, and some people with their animals.  
  
Many of its shapes, forms, and appearances are found on the face of the earth. One doesn't have to look hard in order to find it, true love is a rare occurrence but real nonetheless.  
  
Grief is love's complete opposite. It doesn't allow any time to be used to the situation, it commands attention and makes it impossible to normally function. The mind is so completely preoccupied with it that nothing else matters anymore. Men have taken their own lives in order to escape the heart-wrenching feeling of being totally and utterly alone.  
  
It spares no expense and makes no excuses, the person is gone never to return. Somehow that just doesn't sit well with people, they can't accept that there is nothing more they can do. It makes them question their own mortality and the fact that the only think keeping them alive is about the size of their fist.  
  
Pumping away in the center of their chests, it is the only thing that protects them from the cold hand of death. What awaits those who have already been taken? That's a universal question, is it pearly white gates or roads paved in gold? White winged women strumming harps and singing, or an iced road of fire in a dimension too horrible to imagine?  
  
Grief is the master of mind-tricks, it makes people lose all sense of time and the capacity to move on with their lives. What is it's purpose exactly if not to remind them daily of who is now lost to them for as long as their hearts serve to keep them alive. There is no joy in life anymore, no icing on the proverbial cake. Just a dismal, long, dreary life of remembering.  
  
Abberline was not a man driven too strongly by either. Love was known to him, but not sought after. Grief he had conquered and had no wish to repeat the experience. Any of them. Inspector Frederick Abberline was only driven by his willpower to live and experience all he could, do as much to save as he did to destroy.  
  
None had seen him so much as blink an eye at a crime scene, no murder had ever been refused by him and that was what made him such a legend. Only one case ever got away, that was the Ripper case.  
  
The year was 1888, some say the sky bled with all of the violence and bloodshed of the times. It was a year that would never be forgotten, books would be written and legends would circulate, all because of one man. He called himself Jack the Ripper and lived well up to his name.  
  
Godley had known Abberline, the two worked on cases together in cramped offices and pubs all over the godforsaken city streets. Godley knew only a little of Abberline, they preferred it that way. That Abberline had had a wife who died in labor giving birth to his son was all that Godley cared to hear about. The rest he left to imagination and long nights when the gin was too easily passed.  
  
Abberline understood that Godley was a man who worked to escape, it was a feeling he was well accustomed too. The thrill of catching a criminal, a murderer, or a thief was enough to sustain them... for the time being at least.  
  
Love and grief had touched both their lives in equal shares, but what made them different was that they hadn't been defeated by them. They still worked, got along, and lived to see another day.  
  
It didn't seem as if Abberline would get over them just as easily this time. Whitechapel was a district that didn't take to human weakness. Just the opposite in fact, all traces of weakness were stamped out of it's citizens by the end of a fortnight. All that was left was a hollow empty shell where emotion and feeling had once run rampant. It sucked all joy and life out of a body as sure as if death had come calling.  
  
Godley watched as Abberline paced the small room to stand by the window once again. His eyes searched yet looked for nothing, he wondered if the Inspector even saw anything in the gloom. This city was no good for a man who suffered from both love and grief.  
  
Mary Kelly might still be alive, but she was as dead to Abberline as if he had killed her himself. The only source of light in the room came from three lit lanterns that Abberline kept lit all the time whether it be day or night. He hardly ate anything and drank only gin and a few drops of absinthe. The man was slowly losing his will to live.  
  
Withers was no help although he was the only one that could get the flare of rage into Abberline's eyes anymore. When the bottle was empty he would rage against the head of Scotland Yard swearing death would be repaid.  
  
Do you question my decision?  
  
The bottle would smash on the cobblestones outside, Abberline having thrown it there in such anger never seen before. Godley knew that he wouldn't hurt anyone much less himself, but he sometimes wondered what would become of Withers should the two of them be left alone.  
  
Mary Kelly.  
  
Abberline and she had known one another for only a few short weeks, hardly even enough time for a 'by your leave' before love caught hold of them and sunk it's arrows into their hearts. They were not easily led astray, had it not been for an insane murderer and desperation, they might never have met.  
  
Now she was somewhere in Ireland while Abberline rotted in the cold, harsh, unforgiving desolate city of Whitechapel. Godley wondered why he wouldn't just retire and move to Ireland to find her. No one would know if he did, and he would be there to keep an eye on Withers and Scotland Yard for them.  
  
Every time he brought the matter up, Abberline would shake his head no and say it was for the best. Each time his eyes got a little darker and he would stand by the window a little longer. What he was looking for was known only to him.  
  
Abberline never went to the 'Ten Bells' anymore or would hear any mention of the Ripper case. A flash of red hair would turn his head, but then he would light a cigarette and curse himself for a fool.  
  
The Nichols gang was off the streets, they were long dead from prison and men who had been wronged by them. Life was fairly simple now with only the normal beaten to death unfortunate and drunken brawl to contend with.  
  
The good in the whole incident was that Abberline no longer searched out the laudanum and absinthe concoction to 'see' anymore. 'Chasing the dragon' had long since been given up courtesy of Jack.  
  
Godley knocked on the door one day and heard no reply. Usually Abberline would come to the door, open it, and resume his position at the window, but today there was nothing.  
  
He pushed the door open and found the room stripped of anything that had been there the previous day. The only thing left was Abberline's pocketwatch that he had carried around for luck. There was no note or explanation of any kind.  
  
If truth be told, Godley had expected something like this to have happened. There was only so much punishment a man could take before breaking under the strain. Abberline hadn't been broken, he had rebelled until the very last moment.  
  
Gasping and fighting, he had found a way out of the madness. Godley hoped that he had bought a ticket and was on his way to Ireland. If not their paths would cross again one day, perhaps in an opium den or maybe in heaven. Hell more like if their lives were any indication.  
  
He took of his hat and sighed deeply, Abberline he hoped, had finally found some peace. Closing the door, mentally and physically, he made his way to the 'Ten Bells' where he would find something to eat before heading back to Scotland Yard.  
  
Love and grief are two very difficult things to deal with. Abberline had dealt with both of them at the same time. How could he love someone who was still alive, but lost to him forever? Godley grinned in spite of the drudgery surrounding him, if his prediction was worth anything Abberline had found her, loved her, and if he knew what was good for him, never try to lose her again.  
  
Authors Note 3: I tend to get very philosophical at times, the fist part of this was a mere part of my inner musings. Lol. Anyway, I had to get it into writing somehow, did you all like it? What did you think? Let me know, I'm dying to hear, or read, your thoughts on this short story inspired by Johnny Depp's brilliant performance in 'From Hell.' Review button, right there... 


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